MONTREAL — The full title of this film, Jimmy P. (Psychotherapy of a Plains Indian), may have been cut for brevity. It may also have been done so as not to scare anyone away. Because the title pretty much says it all. You won’t find yourself watching much else in this film than the playing out of numerous therapy sessions provided to the titular Jimmy Picard.

Of course, it helps that Picard is played by one Benicio Del Toro, who claims at least some amount of indigenous blood in his Puerto Rican ancestry. It also helps that his therapist Georges Devereux is incarnated by French actor Mathieu Amalric, who brings an engaging vitality to the role.

And it helps that the film is based on a true story, taken from Devereux’s 1951 book Reality and Dream: Psychotherapy of a Plains Indian. The French-American ethnologist and Freudian psychoanalyst was a bit of an eccentric, if we are to believe Arnaud Desplechin. The French director overcomes melodramatic tendencies in the early part of the movie to settle into something more subtle and interesting — the tête-à-tête between two excellent actors fully inhabiting their roles.

There is something of The King’s Speech to Jimmy P., with its tale of a wacky mentor helping a traumatized pupil overcome his troubles and become a man.

At the start of the film, Picard is living with his sister on a Montana farm in the early 1950s. The army veteran is a mess, overwhelmed by randomly occurring bouts of headaches and blindness. He is brought to a medical facility in Topeka, Kan., where despite their good intentions and open minds, they don’t know what to make of him.

Likable department head Dr. Karl Menninger (Larry Pine) overrules his stuffy underlings and calls on old friend Devereux, who is living the good life in New York City.

The film finds its tone when Devereux and Picard meet. There is electricity between the two men. Del Toro injects his character, a Blackfoot Indian, with a lifetime of repressed hurt, some of it institutional, some of it familial and some of it brought on by the simple pain of heartache.

Amalric provides the spark of energy the film needs. His fascination and concern for Picard is matched by his extensive knowledge of and curiosity about the various Native American tribes and their ways.

Like therapy itself, the film progresses slowly but steadily toward its ultimately satisfying conclusion.

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